


The Last Kiss

by sherlock221Bismymuse



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Grief/Mourning, Heavy Angst, M/M, Pining, True Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-28
Updated: 2019-03-28
Packaged: 2019-12-25 17:55:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,149
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18266459
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sherlock221Bismymuse/pseuds/sherlock221Bismymuse
Summary: “This is how I would dieinto the love I have for you:As pieces of clouddissolve in sunlight.”Rumi





	The Last Kiss

**Author's Note:**

> Please heed tags! Major character death. For real.  
> Tissue alert! Get the whole box already...

 

The envelope lay on his desk. A large but slim rectangle. Addressed to him.

From Slaughter, Anderson & Co.

‘Legal advisors to Mr. Sherlock Holmes’ it said.

.

.

Anthea had brought it in along with the morning tea and left it there after a quick glance at her boss.

Both faces were impossible for anyone else to decipher but they could read volumes from each other.

Concern, solidarity, support.

Deep sorrow, rage, despair.

 

Mycroft had never expected his brother to outlive him, thanks to his dangerous lifestyle that involved either chasing criminals down the streets of London or chasing drugs up the veins of his own body.

But till yesterday he had never realized (or more likely had been in denial) that the entire purpose of his existence, as it had suddenly become clear, had been to keep Sherlock safe and alive.

He had never felt as untethered as when he stood at the graveyard watching the only thing holding him back on this planet being buried six feet under. This time for real.

He had taken the violin home with him and stayed up with it in his lap till he fell asleep on the armchair. He woke up wondering how he could continue existing…..why the earth kept revolving…… and what made the sun rise again.

He started wondering how he could make it all stop.

_Sherlock?_ He called out silently. _Why should_ _I carry on living?_

_._

_._

And then the answer had showed up on his desk this morning along with his cup of Assam tea and two thin biscuits.

He looked at the name of the legal firm and felt a twinge of exasperation. He was sure Sherlock chose them for their name and not for any special legal qualifications.

_Brat_ , he thought fondly.

He finished his tea and biscuits, staring at the envelope warily all the time like it was a hooded cobra.

Finally when he could not avoid it any longer, he took his pen knife and opened it.

A notebook slid out and he pulled out a folded piece of paper that seemed to be a letter.

As though in a trance he picked up the notebook. It was familiar. It was from his own bespoke collection and must have been ‘liberated’ by Sherlock many years ago.

And the first page had a date on it.

A date he would never forget.

.

.

He turned the pages to see that the notebook had dates, just dates, in chronological order but no clear pattern or frequency……written in a different pen on most days.

He was cataloguing and analysing even as he turned the pages and after 10 pages he realized what these were.

They were the dates of every single day or night that they had been able to spend together.

Mostly single dates.

No weekends, no long holidays, there had never been time……… never enough time………….

And now there was no time at all.

The shadows, the whispers, the soft murmurings and declarations of love and longing, the sound of desire and fulfillment, the changing patterns of breathing as he moved from deep sleep to wakefulness, the touches and caresses, the loving glances, the unconditional surrender……. every memory, every kiss, every moan rose like a mist from those pages.

Every single date an arrow through his heart because every night they spent together had ended in a farewell a few hours later.

There were many empty pages and then on the last page of the notebook something had been written in Sherlock’s scrawl.

Of course…… his brother could not have known how many pages he would need for the dates he was recording.

Too few thought Mycroft….too few…. with regret tearing him apart.

Too- few too- few too- few said the beat of his traitorous heart.

How _dare_ it continue beating inside his ribs when he had just buried it underground yesterday??

Even he had not known that the kiss they shared last week would be the last kiss……the last kiss ever…..

Mycroft couldn’t see what was written on that last page. He thought he needed his reading glasses before he realized there were tears splashing down on the pages. He allowed himself the luxury of a few tears…………. _wondering how many would be enough to wipe away his grief?_

Oceans and oceans of them probably….….

Finally he wiped his eyes to read.

The last page of that notebook.

The last ever page.

 

_Beloved,_

_If you are reading this then somehow my wish has been granted and I am going before you. You know I was always the impatient one!_

_Also, I would not have survived a single day without you, so it is better this way._

_You must have realized by now what these dates are._

_These were the days that made the rest of it worth living, My._

_Please don’t grieve me too much. I am a part of you and always will be._

_I know that we will meet again somewhere, somehow, my love._

_Even death cannot do us apart._

_._

_._

Mycroft sat there for a thousand years. Ten thousand years.

The Voyager reached Alpha Centauri. The Sun became a Red Giant and swallowed up the Earth.

Millions of galaxies were created and destroyed.

Finally he blinked and with trembling hands he picked up the letter.

.

.

**Last Will and Testament**

This is my last will and testament.

Being of sound mind and body, I, Sherlock Holmes do hereby bequeath to Mycroft Holmes the guardianship of the following:

Six children I rescued during my two years away. They are currently in safe houses but they know that my powerful and amazing hero of a big brother will be coming to visit them soon and taking them away to a better place.

Izabel b2000 Brazil

Shamlee b 2001 Nepal

Adam b 2003 Morocco

Vladimir b 2006 Belarus

Gulrez b2007 Pakistan

Ana-Maria b2007 Romania

 

Mycroft--I tried to do for them what you did for me but you will be so much better at this than I could ever be.

Please be their redemption and refuge the way you were mine.

Always.

_Sherlock Holmes_

_._

_._

And now Mycroft wept freely as he was overcome with a tidal wave of sorrow ....and pride! So much pride....... till he thought his heart would truly burst.

Finally the student had surpassed the master.

He had left his brother a puzzle and a task that would silence the wailing inside his head and give him a reason for living. He knew that Mycroft lived only to save Sherlock and to love him and now he would live to save those and love those who had been under Sherlock’s protection.

He had repaid every single time that Mycroft had saved him, by saving Mycroft today.

He had outsmarted him if that was the last thing he did.

Even in death he had managed to give Mycroft the kiss of life.


End file.
